Recording media for a moving-picture recording apparatus are mainly of the cassette type at the present time but optical disk media also have appeared. A moving-picture image sensing apparatus capable of utilizing an IC memory card for recording when still pictures are taken also has become generally available.
Digital cameras originally possessed only a still-picture recording function and many of these cameras use an IC memory card as the recording medium. In recent years, however, many of these cameras also have a moving-picture recording function and the recording of moving pictures on these IC memory cards is now common practice.
An increase in the recording capacity of IC memory cards and improvements in moving-picture compression techniques can be mentioned as reasons why moving pictures are now being recorded on IC memory cards. Nevertheless, the recording capacity of IC memory cards in general use at the present time is still inadequate for recording moving pictures. However, since IC memory cards generally are compact, it is conceivable that there will appear a moving-picture recording apparatus that attempts to furnish storage capacity for recording of moving pictures by utilizing a plurality of IC memory cards.
In such a moving-picture recording apparatus, which is equipped with a plurality of interfaces for recording media such as IC memory cards, assume that a plurality of recording media (e.g., two media referred to as IC memory card 1 and IC memory card 2) have been inserted and that IC memory card 1 runs out of available recording capacity while recording of a moving picture on IC memory card 1 is in progress. Processing conceivable in such case is to treat the moving picture up to this point in time as one moving-picture file, close the file and terminate recording or, alternatively, continue recording the scene on the other card, namely IC memory card 2.
In the alternative case, however, moving-picture information or data that is intended originally to be a single continuous shot (a single cut) is recorded spanning a plurality of recording media. As a result, managing the recording media is complicated and there is also a problem is terms of convenience when the recorded moving-picture information is utilized. Accordingly, it is preferred that a moving picture of a single shot be recorded so as to fit on a single recording medium to the greatest extent possible.